


Leap of Faith

by paradiamond



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Emotional Repression, Hermann POV, Hermann's specific and meticulous thought process, Kissing, M/M, Shao as an ally, exploring the logistics of Newt's captivity, no crazy Newt, references to Slaughterhouse-five, references to previous self harm but nothing extreme, unsafe Drifting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-07
Updated: 2018-04-07
Packaged: 2019-04-19 22:06:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14246724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paradiamond/pseuds/paradiamond
Summary: Faith, like love, had been a foreign concept to Hermann for a long time. In some ways it still was, which was why he put the world’s fate in a human’s hands instead. Because if Hermann was going to do something stupid, really stupid, then he needed help.Or, Hermann Drifts with Newt, who is potentially still a Kaiju.





	Leap of Faith

**Author's Note:**

> So I wanted to look at Newt’s perspective on the events of the past ten years, the gradual process of how that all happened, and I wanted Hermann to Drift with him. At which point I had to wonder why he would...do that as a rational, scientific type person? And here we are.
> 
> Thanks to my Discord buddies for all the support! <3

Newton Geiszler, holder of six doctorates, former savior of the world, and love of Hermann’s life, was living in what was essentially a plexiglass box. 

Hermann regarded him from the other side, hands folded one over the other on his cane, and his jaw set in a hard line. He watched him through the plastic, working up the nerve to go inside. At the moment, Newt was sitting at the table, a large, heavy piece that was bolted to the floor. The chairs, on the other hand, were harmless, lightweight plastic and free moving. Everything in the room was designed that way, with a double meaning. They were sensible precautions since in the beginning, Newt had been a risk to both others and to himself. 

It galled him to see Newt locked up in this way, but at least he was no longer strapped to a chair. In truth, he was aware of how lucky they were. Things were, for the most part, improving. He shouldn't complain. 

As it turned out, Newt’s body had been awash with microscopic light particles that behaved like parasites, centered in the prefrontal cortex his brain. Surprisingly straightforward, all things considered. Horrifying and sickening, yes. But relatively simple to fix, once they identified the issue. It almost seemed wrong, after all that trouble, all that death, that they should be able to reverse the process in such a direct way. 

The treatment took time, of course. But that they had to spare. Newt, in particular, had nothing but time. 

He had come out of what Hermann had taken to thinking of as the Bad Period mostly unharmed, which was the best operating standard they had at the moment. Some of his tattoos were a little worse for the wear, since he he’d been scratching at them, but they took care of that. Hermann knew all this in a clinical, detached kind of way. He knew it the way he knew how many people died died during the hybrid attacks.

In the cube, Newt finally glanced up and noticed him. He immediately brightened, motioning for Hermann to come in with an expression bordering on normal. Hermann smiled back, thankful that they were past the point of blank stares and guilt ridden refusals, then reached out and pressed his palm to the door, and it opened for him. 

Newt watched him approach, keeping his seat. He knew better than to make any sudden moves, both for Hermann’s sake and for his own. They didn't want to deal with any more false alarms When Hermann sat, Newt smiled at him. “Hey. Guess you haven’t opened any breaches yet.” 

“Not today, no.” 

“Probably for the best. We worked pretty hard to close it the first time.”

Hermann smirked, and it felt strange on his face. “Indeed.” 

Newt had given the PPDC everything. He drew pictures, made maps, wrote down every piece of information he could remember that flowed from the two-way connection. Hermann had diagrams of ships, sensor arrays, genetic profiles, military tactical plans. It was amazing the kind of intel they were able to compile from just one part of one brain, not even from the dominant species. But that was the nature hive mind, Newt explained. Everything at once. Seeing and seen always. Books could, and one day would, be written from it all. 

Every piece of information was vital, and it breathed life back into Newt to have something of substance to do. It was, of course, all entirely useless if they didn’t know if the PPDC didn’t know if they could trust Newt, which they didn’t. And that was the real problem. 

Newt leaned back in his chair, a risky maneuver on the thin plastic, falsely cocky. It made him at least seem more like his old self. It was why Hermann had them put together a ten year old wardrobe, and find his old glasses. The semblance of normalcy. “Have a test for me?” 

Hermann shook his head. “Not today.” 

“Damn.” Newt tapped on the table, and it lit up. “I’m good at passing tests.” 

The light drew Hermann’s eye. The tabletop was designed to be a massive tablet, though of course it was disconnected from any network, stripped of any and all security risks. It even ran solely on batteries. The interface contained programs for him to write in, reading materials, computerized games, and puzzles. Newt’s mind would turn over on itself without near continual stimulation, and that was under normal circumstances. Catching his eye, Hermann smiled at him and sat down. 

They’d both been trying to think of new ways to prove he wasn’t compromised anymore. He’d done everything. Hypnotism. Drugs. Extensive dream mapping. He passed every test, but they didn’t really know what they were testing for, and the PPDC remained unsatisfied. Hermann had his own tests, and Newt kept flying through them, proving to him again and again that he was the Newt Hermann knew to be real. Every infuriating, wonderful part of him. Eventually it would be enough. 

Hermann turned the problem over in his mind, familiar as an old story. Testing Newt’s memory was pointless, since the Precursors had open access to everything in the Drift. Hermann had given him every humanity test under the sun, but those were only effective on the surface. At the moment there was no way of knowing if the Precursors had simply pulled back, past their line of recognition, and they couldn’t risk a relapse, not at this stage. 

“You haven’t felt anything strange?” 

“I thought we landed on that I wouldn't know it even if I had,” Newt responded dully, his eyes still fixed on the screen. “But no, still nothing.” 

Hermann nodded. He passed every single lie detector test with flying colors. Newt said they were gone from his conscious thought and were no longer overtly directing his actions. But that didn’t mean anything about his latest impulses, his thoughts, or his emotions. 

There was also, on a more practical level, no way of knowing how much the Precursors were able to control the hive mind, if they did at all. The human understanding of the collective was based on the conceptual framework of separate entities sharing with each other via a telepathic bridge, but that might not be how they operated at all. 

“Over the course of the past ten years did you ever have the sense that the connection between the sample brain and the hive mind was altered in any way?” 

That made Newt pause. “It- it was always changing. Shifting. I think it was due to having so many organisms in one...stream, then it was about the connection being manipulated, if that’s what you’re asking.” 

Hermann nodded, maintaining his professional manner. “Essentially.” 

Some twisted emotion turned up on Newt’s face, and he looked away, back down to the screen. Hermann ignored it, keeping his focus on the task at hand. Sometimes, it felt like if he engaged with this, really dealt with the fact that this was Newton in there and not some puzzle, he would break and become useless. And where would that leave Newt? Who would advocate for him then? 

Hermann had pulled favors, cajoled, submitted form after form. The sheets on his bed, the opaque privacy barrier blocking his toilet from the outward facing wall. The clear wall itself, instead of the one way mirror they wanted to install, pointlessly, Hermann had argued, if they were also putting the cameras. It was difficult enough for Newt to be watched, let alone to be watched when he didn't know it. 

Hermann bit and scratched and clawed for Newt’s dignity, and he couldn’t give it up now because Newt had taken his fork to his arm, trying to scrape off a snarling face. He had been upset. It was understandable. He’d heal. It would be fine, and then Hermann would be fine again too. 

“Whatever you need to do, just do it. Anything,” Newt said, too quickly, and smiled. He was wretched. Hermann looked away, heart rate picking up. Stress. He took a deep breath. 

“Good. It’s clear that they maintained a connection to all active brains, but the Kaiju were slaves to them, not equals, and clearly did not have the same intelligence or agency. Were they kept that way simply by their biological makeup?” He hesitated, pulling the strands of the problem apart like lines of code. “A human drifting with a dog, for example, would not give the dog the ability to speak or make reasoned judgements.” 

Newt bobbed his head, long accustomed to Hermann thinking out loud now. The second part, Hermann did not voice. Were they controlled through what they were and were not shared in the hive? The potential that Newt was fed incorrect information remained. 

Newt sighed, apparently at random, and closed out the program he'd been picking at. He looked away, but stretched his hand out, towards Hermann. The white bandages peeking out from under his sleeve made Hermann’s heart clench. He reached back, linking their fingers together, and Newt’s edges seemed to soften somewhat, relaxing in a way that Hermann couldn’t afford. 

Human contact was another luxury for him now, and it pulled at Hermann’s heart that he couldn't give it to him all the time, that they were monitored and he wouldn't be allowed to spend the night even if he asked. Just to sleep in the same bed, innocent as children, would mean so much. Hermann wanted to hear him as he slept, feel him at peace for once. Instead he would go up thirty floors and sleep on the cot he kept in his office, as content as possible given the circumstances. 

“How are you?” Hermann asked finally, because he couldn’t help it. “Is there anything I can do?” 

“Anything else, you mean?” Newt joked, as was his habit, and Hermann let it slide. Had their positions been reversed, he didn’t know if he could even bear to speak, let alone reach out. Newt took a deep, uneven breath. “I’m kind of…” 

As Newt trailed off, still staring at nothing, Hermann waited. It was part of the new normal. Long, drawn out silences. If they lasted longer than thirty seconds, Hermann prompted him to keep going. Today, he didn’t have to. Newt shook his head as of to clear it, and turned back to him. “I’m kind of reaching the end of the part where I’m just grateful to be alive and didn’t end the whole world. I don’t know what to do here.” 

“Just keep doing what you’re doing,” Hermann said, intentionally sidestepping the point. 

Newt didn’t let him. “Until what? I don’t-” He bit his lip, and visibly changed course, though he didn’t let go of Hermann’s hand, for which he was grateful. “What’s going on outside that you can tell me about? I’d take a sports update at this point, honestly.”

Hermann smirked. “Afraid I can’t help you there.” 

They chatted, and it was grating. If they had work, they could argue, stir themselves up. But Hermann couldn’t bring himself to do it. “Did you read the paper I sent you on genetic editing in insects?” 

Newt nodded, his gaze going distant again. “I- yeah.” 

“What is it?” Hermann jumped on the change in tone, both hopeful and fearful that Newt would actually tell him this time. 

Newt looked at him, the silence stretching taught between them. There was something about his eyes, even past the tired look and dark circles. “I don’t see a way out.”

Hermann stared back at him intently, trying not to let his emotions run away with his sense. “Well. That’s quite alright, because you don’t have to. I’m going to find it. Can you wait?”

After what felt like a very long time, Newt nodded. 

Hermann nodded back, but didn’t allow it when Newt moved to pull his hand back, and Newt ending up shifting closer instead, opening the program with his non-dominant left to show him some equations. They flew by like birds, completely mysterious to Hermann, lost as he was in his own thoughts. Really, the only time he didn’t feel lost lately was when he worked, when he moved towards solving the problem. Then everything would be fine. Newt would be safe, and they would be together again. 

“You with me?” Newt teased, probably well aware that his mind was far away. 

Hermann blinked, then nodded. “Yes,” he said, and shifted even closer, so that they might as well share one chair. “Go on.” 

This time, Hermann would not let go. He would not let Newt slip away. He would not fail either of them again. 

***

The space where the Kaiju brain was once kept now stood conspicuously empty, and Hermann eyed it with distaste. He had never actually seen it there, they had come in and cleaned the place out before he was allowed in, which was likely fortunate considering the emotional state Hermann found himself in at that time. He wasn’t sure what he would have done, if he had come in here and found the brain. Hermann looked away. In any case, it didn’t tell him much about what he wanted to know, though Newt’s trashed apartment rarely did. 

It had been absolutely turned over by the PPDC. This, Hermann did not dispute. After the crisis was over they could talk about civil rights and being to piece together some of his physical life, his things. But not now. 

Hermann made his way back out into the main space, which was one long room with different sections delineated by furniture. It all seemed incredibly out of character for Newt, and for a moment he was struck by the unreality of it all. Most of the time, Hermann tried not to dwell on the details, on what he might or might not have noticed if he’d had regular access to Newt’s life. Would the gaudy apartment have been enough to make him see through the mirage? It seemed unlikely. Just another in a long line of changes to tell Hermann he had no place in Newt’s new life. He would have seen rejection, not terror. 

The center coffee tabled had been righted, by Hermann, and subsequently spread with papers. Page after page of notes, sketches, seemingly random printouts. The PPDC had taken everything they deemed of value, scientific or otherwise, and left behind the rest. It was those leftover puzzle pieces Hermann was primarily interested in now. The misshapen, strange ones, that might inform him on not what Newt was doing, but his state of mind at any given moment. 

He sat down on the couch, and surveyed the mess. The Precursors had obviously penetrated deeply into his mind in order to exert that sort of direct control on a complex, autonomous organism. To completely override his will, as had been obviously occuring when Hermann discovered it, was monumental. Relative to humans, the Kaiju were simplistic organisms. Their brain size to mass ratio was small, hence the secondary brain, and especially as compared to humans. If they could have taken over Newt right away, they clearly would have done so, but Newt described it as a gradual build, and even then, not a complete one. 

What was continually interesting to Hermann were Newt’s dinner invitations. He had clearly wanted him there, he had wanted him to see. Why? Hermann flipped open a file and glanced through it, barely taking in the information. That late in the process, the Precursors should have known it was a bad idea to involve others so far in their plans. Unless they planned to kill him, but that too, served no purpose as an end on its own. They were reacting with emotion, with violence. Or they were being cruel and allowing Newt and unfulfilled sliver of hope. Malice. Another emotion. 

They reacted to Jake Pentecost with anger too, as an enemy, not as a bug, not a thing to be moved to the side. An equal. It was a comforting thought, all things considered. 

With Hermann though, it seemed different. Newt spoke of that last terrible time as being in a dream where the world was not real and the rules were different. Moments of clarity. But most of the time, under more benign circumstances, they didn’t force his hand, but guided it. He became part of them, part of their design. The central argument of the PPDC was that the extent to which that was still the case was uncertain, and it was up to Hermann to prove otherwise. 

Hermann turned another page, dread building under his skin. Until they knew, until they were completely sure that Newt was free of them, he couldn’t be allowed out. There was too much at stake. At least now things were calmer. Better. 

Before, it was worse. It was terrible for all of them, Newt for the crushing guilt, the memories. Marshall Hansen for his absence, the flashbacks to his son. Jake Pentecost for the directionless anger, suddenly unmoored by Newt’s recovery of himself. Hermann himself for obvious reasons. 

Newt had been plainly depressed, and understandably so. His life, it seemed, was over. His work as he knew it was certainly over. It was unclear whether he should ever be let near a computer again, let alone be given clearance or access to Kaiju data. They wanted him for the information he could provide. After that? 

“Maybe they should kill me,” Newt had said one of the first times Hermann had visited him, from the floor. He was leaning against the back wall of the clear prison, his arms propped up on his bent knees. “It might be the right move, you know, strategically.” 

Hermann stood very still in front of him, and squeezed his cane so tightly his hand went numb. “Don’t be-”

“Ridiculous? Stupid?” Newt threw back, his tone not quite matching the venom of the words. “Pretty sure I’m a murderer, and if it was anyone else-”

“Well, it isn’t,” Hermann snapped. “You are not anyone else, not to me, not to this war, and not to the people you will help save when we get this straightened out. You are important.” 

Newt just stared up at him, his face disturbingly devoid of any expression. Shock, Hermann knew. It came and went. 

“To me, especially. You are important to me,” Hermann added, suddenly desperate to make Newt understand. He didn’t want to speak in code anymore. “I can't let you go.”

The declaration did not have the desired effect. Newt’s face twisted into something terrible, and he curled further into himself. “Sure you can.”

That, of all things, got Hermann’s blood boiling. “Newton.” 

“What?” His voice rose to almost a yell, the sudden swing back to emotionalism jarring. “You did it before. Just do it again.” 

Hermann had wanted to hit him then, or maybe to scream. But the utter lack of fight in Newt’s eyes, not to mention the drawn, sickly cast of his body from the treatments, made that impossible. He was impossible. When Hermann left, he felt the same hopelessness in the elevator, in the halls, and in his room. It followed him, clinging to the hem of his shirt. But that was before. 

Now, things were better. Time healed all wounds, Hermann knew that more than most. It had healed Newt so far, and it would continue to do so. Eventually, he would be ready to leave, ready to come back out into the world and take his life back, and when that happened Hermann needed to have the found a way to open the door for him, convince himself and the others that he really was right, that he wasn’t beholden to the Precursors anymore. The answer, Hermann suspected, was in these papers. 

He set the folder down and picked up where he left off the last time, with a sort of color coded drawing that he still didn’t understand and Newt seemed reluctant to speak about when he asked. It was repeated with subtle variations on other papers, but this one was both the most complex and the most recent, judging from the date in the far corner. 

It seemed to run landscape from left to right, and consisted of several different colors of lines that went from one side to the other, meeting and crossing and sometimes disappearing before they reached the end. Some had labels, but they were, for the most part, nonsensical to Hermann. The red line on this sheet was labeled three times, once with ‘science’, then with ‘may’, and finally with a question mark that extended down to the green line. It was all like that, and it was an absolute mess. 

When Hermann looked at them, for there were about twelve or thirteen that he had found so far, his mind saw circuits and patterns where he suspected they did not exist. Bizarrely, half of them came in the form of individual pieces of paper taped together and then rolled up into tubes, like scrolls. 

Hermann sighed and tossed the blasted thing back to the table, but missed, causing it to flutter to the floor. He glared at it, childish in his offense, before leaning over to pick it up again, and caught sight of something written on the back in Newt’s cramped handwriting. Hoping for an explanation, Hermann picked it back up, and found something else instead. 

**no secrets from himself s5**

Hermann frowned. The short line was verging on poetic, and Newton did not write like that. Most likely a quote then, which would make the letter and number a reference point. In all likelihood, it was nothing, but still, he was intrigued, and so he pulled out his phone to search for the little phrase. 

As it turned out, it was simple to find because the source was so well known. The ‘s5’ apparently referred to the novel ‘Slaughterhouse Five’, a book apparently about a man abducted by aliens. The full quote was also listed as, ‘He had supposed for years that he had no secrets from himself.’ Not code then, just a memory. Hermann frowned, unsure for a moment why this meant something to him until he remembered something else. 

He stood, and made his way back to the bedroom, and really, of course Newt would end up in an apartment of this size that still had _stairs_ in it. The empty space was still there, of course, but he had no care for it this time. Just as he remembered, the book sat upside down on the bedside table, either kept their by Newt or thrown there by the search party. Intrigued, Hermann sat down on the bed as he’d done many times before and flipped to the relevant page. 

The writing was not particularly dense, and it was easy to immediately spot what he was looking for. ‘’He had supposed for years that he had no secrets from himself.’ Clear enough, but immediately followed by a second, far more discouraging line. ‘Here was proof that he had a great big secret somewhere inside, and he could not imagine what it was.’ 

Hermann frowned and lowered the book, keeping his thumb in place. The book itself was a mess, having been highlighted, annotated, and otherwise abused almost to the point of complete disintegration. Newt wasn't much for novels, Hermann knew. But this one, he clearly obsessed over, read it to destruction. Related to it, found enough meaning in the words to write them down on the back of his projects. A great big secret. 

The drawings, or whatever they were, sat open on the table in the other room where Hermann could just see their colors. Of course, he didn’t need to look to remember, he’d stared at them long enough he knew them like he knew his own mind. Or Newton’s mind. 

Science, may. Other labels were ‘find’, ‘mother’, and ‘hiding.’ Concepts. Hermann squeezed the book so hard it bent, likely permanently creasing the already ruined cover. Ideas. They were Newt’s attempts to trace back the genesis of his ideas, to separate them out from the hive mind, figure out where each one originated, when they became corrupted. What was his and what was theirs? 

Hermann breathed in carefully, then out, fighting a losing battle against his own body. Newt was telling him the truth, he knew it, he felt it. But he couldn’t trust Newt’s perceptions. How could he, if Newt didn’t even understand them himself? 

Hermann leaned forward and put his head in his hands, trying to stave off the headache before it could come. Of course, the dread was worse. 

It made sense. An idea such as ‘the work is the most important thing’ was not dangerous in and of itself, but married to the will of the Precursors? It could be twisted. It could be difficult to know, perhaps even impossible, if severing the connection to the hive undid the damage. 

Hermann picture a chart with two sides. Newt, as he said once himself, was ‘practically gift wrapped’ for them in that sense. With prodding, his thoughts and desires could be tied to theirs. The need for attention and acclaim, his position at Shao. The burning drive to know, to understand the Kaiju, the Drifts. The fear of rejection...the distance from Hermann himself. Everything lined up. It was a perfect environment for them. Though perhaps a smaller mind would have simply been taken over quicker, and would not have had Hermann to help him untangle the mess. 

It wasn’t his fault, Hermann thought, sitting up straight and wringing the book in his hands. He struggled to retain even a shred of objectivity. That would save them. Facts, data, and a well reasoned approach. It wasn’t Newt’s fault, but that didn’t mean it would leave him alone, that he would be free, unless Hermann found a way to save him. 

He hadn't been locked out of his own mind, but joined to theirs. That, Hermann thought, was perhaps the most important point. He had the tendency to think of it as a Drift, with two individuals linked, sharing space, but distinct. But in Newt’s case, it wasn’t as simple as separate sides. As their presence grew, they became more interwoven, not larger. And if Newt couldn’t pull the threads apart, how could Hermann expect him to know if they were really gone? 

The chaotic drawings stared back at him, unforgiving. But one thing was clear, he couldn’t go on like he had been. Hermann had been operating under the assumption that the part of Newt that was the Precursors was gone, that it had been cut away like a bad limb, because that’s what Newt said, and he believed him. 

But if Newt didn’t even understand his own mind, if he couldn’t distinguish for himself what was him and what was them, then they needed a change of strategy. And Hermann knew just who to turn to for help. 

***

Hermann stood very still as the elevator moved near silently, pulling him up and up to the floor Dr. Shao had been given at the PPDC. He had never been there before, and she had never visited his research department. It rather felt like he was going into the lion’s den armed with nothing but a cane, a book, and a folder. For the most part, they gave each other a wide berth. 

They hadn’t gotten along very well ever since the first meeting after the victory at Mt. Fuji, when she tried to have him ejected from the Council. 

“Gottlieb is compromised,” Shao had said, very quickly, as soon as the last person had sat down. A palpable wave of shock rode through the room. Hermann himself experienced a moment of terrible doubt. But surely he would have felt it by now. Ten years. They would have stopped him from interfering with the incident at Mt. Fuji. There was no reason to think-

“He’s emotionally compromised,” she clarified, her eyes still fixed on him, dark and intense. “He knocked the gun away when I tried to stop Dr. Geiszler.”

“When you tried to kill Dr. Geiszler,” Hermann clarified. 

Shao turned and sent a pointed look to Marshall Hansen. “See what I mean?” 

Hermann straightened his spine as much as possible. It was true, and while he wouldn’t have brought it up, he didn’t deny it either. He’d been avoiding thinking about the fact that there was a straight line between Newt getting away, the Precursors getting away in his body that is, and the near end of the entire world. Even more so, that he would do it all again. 

Still, they wanted to take the fight to the Precursors, their best bet there was clearly Newt and no one knew Newt’s mind better than Hermann. It was the logic of soldiers, spearheaded by Jake Pentecost, who was just brash enough to be truly dangerous, and possibly bold enough to save them all. Shao had never forgiven them for allowing Hermann to stay, but she was too smart to take it out on anyone but Hermann himself. 

The elevator reached Shao’s floor and stopped. The door slid open. Hermann hesitated for so long that it started to close again, and he had to stick his cane out to stop it. He stepped out, and a secretary gave him a sharp look. 

“Hello.” 

She blinked at him, one long, slow blink, as though to stall for time. “Hello. How may I help you?” 

“I don’t have an appointment, but I need to speak with Dr. Shao about Dr. Geisler.” 

If she was surprised, she didn’t show it. Hermann sat down in the chair next to the window and wondered again if he was making a mistake. The logic seemed sound, but it always did. No one did something they believed would fail, unless it was part of a much larger scheme, and Hermann was on his last. If he wanted to save Newt, he had to verify, and prove, that he had been saved. It wasn’t so different from another experiment, except for his personal feelings on the matter. His compromise, as Shao said. 

Hermann believed him. He believed him with his very soul. When he looked in Newt’s eyes, he saw their history. 

But he couldn’t trust that. They were right to rely on him, to use his knowledge, but they would be wrong to trust him. He loved Newt, possibly to the point of no return. What would he risk to see him out of the cell and back by his side? It was everything he wanted. Sometimes it felt like it was all he had ever wanted. If he would risk the world to stop Newt from being shot, what would he risk of himself? What might he miss in his fervor to free him? 

Anything, everything. It seemed simple. He wondered if this was how Newt had felt, before he did the first Drift. How much he knew he would be alright, that he was right, how much faith it must have taken to press that button. 

But it hadn’t been alright, not at all. 

“Dr. Gottlieb.” Shao appeared in the doorway of her office, immaculate as always. The entire floor belonged to her, and the new Jaegers were being built by her hand. In the end, she had somehow still gotten everything she wanted, even if she didn’t see it that way. 

“Dr. Shao,” Hermann responded, perfectly civil, and stood. He followed her into the office, which was both professional and fashionable, if oddly arranged. 

The desk sat not across from the door, but perpendicular to it, in line with the full wall of bookshelves. On the opposite side was a long table with drawings, plans, and pages of measurements. The long window was exactly where he expected it to be, directly across from the door, but it wasn’t until he sat back down in the chair in front of her desk and saw movement out of the corner of his eye that he realized why it was done this way. 

“So,” Shao said, folding her hands one over the other. To Hermann, she seemed cold. Carved from rock. It was what he expected, and exactly why Hermann went to her. She was the balance. Hate to love. 

If Hermann cared for Newt enough to risk everything for him, Shao hated him so much she would kill herself to catch him at something, anything. She was desperate for the pieces of her life back, her life’s work. To her mind, Newt stole it from her. She took a chance on him, and it stabbed her in the back, Precursors or no. 

If Shao had a sense of any of this, she didn’t show it. “I find it surprising that you would come to me for advice on Dr. Geiszler.”

“One might argue that you know him the best, since you spent the most time with him over these past ten years.” It wasn’t strictly speaking true. Newt spent more time with his subordinates than his boss, and Hermann had interviewed them all. 

She arched one delicately shaped eyebrow at him, a clearly practiced gesture. “I don’t know him at all, and I don’t trust him.”

“Good.”

Shao blinked, visibly caught off guard. “I do not understand,” she said, falling back on formality. Hermann wished he could do the same. 

“I’m going to initiate a Drift with him in order to determine once and for all the state of his mind.” 

Both eyebrows flew up this time, and she regarded him with open interest. “I see. And you expect me to, what? Stop you?” 

“No.” Hermann dug his fingers into his knees, hidden away by the desk. “I am asking you to help me, to monitor the procedure. It is my firm belief that Newt is cured, and I know I can prove it. If it were only me...but I recognize that the gravity of the situation calls for a more measured approach.”

“To say the least.” 

Hermann inclined his head. “I know that you think he is still compromised. Perhaps he is, and I simply cannot see it. Knowing this, I trust that will look for every little mistake, anything to prove that the demons that ruined your work are still there.” 

“You presume much.” 

“Am I wrong?” 

“No.” She curled one hand under her chin. “I am to be your control.” 

“Yes. As long as you give me your word that you will do your best. No more no less.”

She regarded him in silence for a long time. “I would kill no innocent man.”

Hermann straightened, letting go of his knees. “Good.”

“This could infect you,” she said, smoothly moving on to the next point. She was, after all, an engineer, and saw everything as its component parts. “We might well lose you as well.” 

“I am aware.” He held out the folder he’d kept clutched in his hands, but retained the book. “These are my neural scans, the baselines. If I am compromised, I trust you’ll will respond appropriately.” 

At first, she eyed the file as though he’d offered her a live snake, but he knew she was always going to take it. Both curiosity and thoroughness were traits they shared. Really, they were quite similar, which might have contributed to the fact that they couldn’t seem to get along under normal circumstances. It was the opposite of the problem he’d had with Newt for all those years. 

Shao took the file. “Assuming I agree to this at all. I can still stop you.” 

This was the part, out of all the possibilities, that he was the most ready for. “You shouldn’t.” 

“Why not,” she challenged, already flipping through the papers that contained Hermann’s briain, his entire life. “I don’t mean to be cruel, Dr. Gottlieb, but the life of Dr. Geiszler is not as important as you think. It’s certainly not as important as keeping you, our Breach expert, alive and whole in this fight.” 

“I disagree. Most of my research can be taken up by another. What Newt- Dr. Geiszler has provided on the Precursors can only be verified by him.” 

“Hm.” Once again, Shao curled a hand under her chin. A real gesture then, rather than a pantomime for boardrooms and shareholders. “Perhaps you’re right. Still, I would prefer not to see you fall. You are a great man, even if they don’t see it.” 

Hermann blinked, caught off guard. “Well I- I don’t intend to. That’s why I’ve come to you.” 

Shao stared at him in silence for a long time. Outside, Hermann could just barely see the skeleton of the city, stretched high in the distance. All the moving parts of humanity, going along as they’d always done. Rebuilding, and creating the new. 

“Well then,” Shao said, standing up. “I suppose we should get started.” 

***

The ride down to where Newt was being kept seemed to take much longer than usual. 

Shao wasn’t with him, busy putting the finishing touches on her end, so Hermann was alone with his thoughts and the derelict book clutched together with a silver briefcase in his left hand, his cane in the other. It was heavy, but a comforting weight, as Hermann had repurposed the Drift training equipment for their needs. In the end it had been simple, once he knew what he needed to do. Documents had been drawn up, plans made, baselines set. All that remained was to act. 

This time, when he entered the outer room, Newt looked up right away, visibly torn between being pleased to see him again and rabidly curious. It was rare for Hermann to visit twice in one day. One way or another, it would likely be the last time he did. 

He knocked, and Newt rolled his eyes as he waved him in, jumping up from where he’d been lying flat on his back on the bed. 

“You know, I don’t actually have control over the door,” Newt said, coming over the table automatically, his eyes roving over Hermann’s person and catching at the briefcase, as it was the most obvious answer. “That’s all you.” 

“I am well aware of that.” Hermann sat down, and set the briefcase to the left of his feet, under the table. Newt’s eyes dropped to that point, as though he could see straight through it, and Hermann all but flung the book at him before he crawl under the table. The yellowing thing with its ripped cover and frayed edges looked strange against the glossy black table top, like an artifact from another world. He wanted Newt thinking about aliens, about time travel. About what happened. 

Newt smiled reflexively as he reached for it. “‘Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.’ Guess you were at the apartment.” 

“I’ve been several times. Looking at your...outlines?” 

“Maps?” Newt shrugged. “I don’t really know what to, uh- They were part of the past few years, when I knew something was wrong, I think. I don’t remember making them before.” 

“As far as I can tell, you didn’t,” Hermann said, quick to reassure him of the parts they could be certain about. “Most of them have dates.” 

Newt bobbed his head, his hands curled all the way around the badly treated book, folding it in half like a rolled up newspaper. “What’s up? You didn’t just bring this to me for fun. I’ve got a digital copy.” 

Hermann didn’t allow himself to hesitate. “I need you to do something for me.” 

“Sure,” Newt said, right away. 

Hermann didn't have time to bask in the trust so easily given. It felt settled, though Hermann suspected it wasn’t. He reached under the table to pull up the briefcase, which really was much heavier than it looked. Newt craned his neck, but didn’t stand or try to take it from him when he opened it. Hermann pulled out one of the pons and handed it over, watching as Newt immediately slid it onto his head. 

“More readings? This is a dull...day,” Newt trailed off as Hermann pushed the case to the side and pulled out the second one. “What are you doing?” 

“Setting up the neural bridge.” 

Newt’s face darkened, and his hand automatically flew to his head, as if to pull the pons off. “No.” 

“Newton-” 

“No!” He stood up, causing the case to jerk almost off the table, Hermann grabbed for it. 

“Sit back down at once!” 

Newt did, his arms crossed. Being locked up had at least given him a sense of following direction, though Hermann suspected that would fade. But it hadn’t taken away his stubbornness. “This is a bad idea, even for you.” 

Hermann didn’t let the words bother him, as he slipped the pons onto his head, though Newt’s immediate negative reaction was telling. “You said anything.” 

“Anything for me.” He shook his head, and his expression began to cloud over. “This is- if they get you too-” 

“They won’t,” Hermann said, trying to project as much authority into his voice as possible. “Trust me.” Newt didn’t know about Shao, he and he couldn’t know, it would compromise everything.

Newt waved his arms, ignoring Hermann when he moved his chair directly next to him, taking the strain off the cords. “This is so- I can't believe you would even-”

Hermann wanted to shake him. “Believe it. You need to believe in me, and do this.” 

The space between then crackled with energy. “Not if it kills you. Not if it ruins your mind, or puts the world at risk again, and-”

“Newt. It won’t,” Hermann said, trying to project as much confidence, as much persuasion into his voice as possible. It worked too well. Newt frowned, an old familiar look crossing onto his face, and Hermann grabbed him by the arms. “Stop thinking.” 

Newt couldn’t be allowed to focus too much on the logic of the situation. He knew Hermann well enough to know his careful nature, his meticulousness, the way he made list after list. Hermann had to keep him in the emotional. If Newt already suspected that something else was going on, Hermann needed him not to complete the thought. 

Without further hesitation, Hermann slid his arms from Newt’s arms to his neck and pulled him forward, sealing him in a kiss that made his heart jump in his chest. Newt made a low sound in his throat, half desperate and half familiar, and grabbed for his waist, holding him firm and Hermann turned his head, finding their place. It wasn’t the first time they’d kissed, not after so many years, but it was the first time since Newt had fallen, and been cured. 

He was the same. Hermann had worried, he supposed. In the back of his mind, he worried that Newt had changed too much, had been too far gone. But he wasn’t, at least not now. He was warm under Hermann’s hands, and alive under his mouth. Their knees fit together like interlocking pieces as they eased closer, as close as possible while still occupying only their own thoughts. 

Sense memory was the most powerful kind, and Newt clearly knew the way Hermann tilted his chin to deepen a kiss, opened his mouth, allowed him in. He knew him, they knew each other, and Hermann was right. He felt it in his bones as Newt ran his tounge over his bottom lip. Newt was there, all there, and he just had to prove it. 

When he pulled away, Newt was glassy eyed, caught in the emotion of it, of having this touch back after so long, and Hermann couldn’t spare the time. 

“Newton.” He reached out, over to the machine, ready to save him. “Now. Trust me.” 

Newt nodded, and before he could say, or think, anything else, Hermann pressed the button. For a moment, it felt like nothing at all. Then his heart jumped to his throat as the feeling of falling, of sliding into each other, hit him in a wave of sudden familiarity. 

***

Images came first, just like they did the last time. Newt standing in front of the tank at the lab. Sitting in a chair at Shao. Running through the streets of Hong Kong. Raising his hand in class. 

Feelings and thoughts overlapped these, and underlying that, a sort of dull aching pain. Physical. His brain was a raw wound, stripped and healing from both the invasion and the treatment. There were no easy pathways. Compared to the first time, it was chaos.

The directionless stream had a center, there at the multitudes of times Newt drifted with the secondary brain. Obsession. Despair. Disappointment. And that was just from Newt. Hermann all but fell into a vortex of it. 

The time he was alone. Anger now, at the Precursors. They took from him. 

Anger at Newt too, what was he thinking? He was a wonder child for too long, even when he was an adult. Nothing too bad had happened yet, so-

He had no way to know-

He knew enough. He knew he was doing something he shouldn’t, that’s why he snuck the brain out. That’s why he didn’t tell anyone. People with nothing to hide don’t hide things. 

Anger at himself. How did he let this happen? Not just the worst of it, but the benign parts too, the missed dinners, the half finished emails, the petty jealousy over a name. 

Guilt for being just a bit relieved that Newt hadn't actually been Newt, that he hadn't been cold to Hermann and he hadn't left him behind, and least not completely. 

A lot of Newt’s therapy, mandatory, closely monitored, justified, revolved around the concept of blame. No one was responsible for the behavior of another. It was important, they said, to try to sort out his actions from theirs, because he wasn’t to blame for anything they did. 

Newt opened a door. He ignored safety protocol. He wilfully disobeyed his training, and he lied. He lied to everyone, for years. In the early days, when he still had control, but something was clearly happening, he hid it, and lied, and let it fester inside of him until it grew into something he couldn’t control. 

When was that, exactly? He didn’t know, it was too loose, to far. Which were his impulses and which were their commands. They sat distinctly in his mind at the end, when he fought for control. Not always though. He tried to map it out, he tried so hard-

Was the idea to combine Kaiju tissue with earth organisms originally his? He had sketches in an old notebook from years ago, way before Hong Kong and and the Drift and everything, of the Kaiju mixed with the Jaegers. Maybe they really did take him from the very first. 

Maybe the reason Hermann didn’t get it, why they didn’t get him, was because he wasn’t the same. He wasn’t wrong and bad and monstrous like Newt. It grew gradually with every secret he tried to unlock. He put their pictures on his skin, why? He used to know. That was before. No one else saw in them what he did, no one else-

That wasn’t true. The TV programs, the bone slum cult, the books, the art, the merchandising. Mixing monsters with monsters wasn’t new either. Newt had the idea, and happened to have the ability to bring it to fruition, that didn’t- 

Newt wasn’t responsible for what the Precursors did with his hands, just his own. He wasn’t responsible for the deaths and the destruction, for the world almost ending again. 

Hermann wasn’t responsible for Newt’s actions either. He wasn’t to blame for Newt leaving, for leaving him, and being sucked in by is new status and the bright possibilities of a saved world. He could have followed, and he didn’t, his pride-

A living organism too complex to understand with one look. So Newt looked again. And again. There was so much about the Kaiju they didn’t understand and in saving themselves, they might have missed their chance. What else was there? What could they use? 

They planted a seed in a willing garden. Weak enough to be pulled, and Newt pulled strings, and he pushed boundaries, and he failed, this time. He let it grow. The same thing happened when he rolled his ankle on the playground, stepping off the slide. He put his foot down wrong, and it just happened. So he hid it. Why? His uncle was so- 

Hermann didn’t want him to leave, but he did it anyway. He was watching Newt go in anger, as though he might just turn around and come back, apologize for not understanding what they saw in the Drift, what they were together. Why didn’t he just say something? 

This was the worst that could have happened. This was it. If he had died-

What remained here was damage, but no other life. No force but their own. The door was closed. It was gone like it never existed, a storm that passed, leaving destruction on the land but not changing the structure of the earth. 

Hermann looked, and he saw Newton, looking back. 

***

Hermann reganined awareness of himself slowly. They were in Newt’s room, in the plastic box. He was slumped against the chair, turned sideways with his arm hooked over the back, his full weight pressed to it, his head poorly cushioned on the knob of his elbow. The whole thing was completely asleep and his fingertips were turning blue. 

He straightened up with a groan, pulling the pons off his head, and Newt rolled his face in his direction, still bent over the table with his head in his arms. His eyes were half closed and his hair stuck up from where he’d been laying on it. 

It was difficult to say exactly, there were no windows and Hermann didn’t feel like activating the table, but it felt like they’d been in the Drift for a long time. Shao had all the time in the world to probe. But Hermann already knew, Newt was clear. 

Newt blinked at him, as though in a daze. “You tricked me.” His voice came out rough, as though he hadn’t spoken in weeks.

Hermann didn’t move, already in a not insubstantial amount of pain from both his arm and his leg. Still, he reached out and set his hand on Newt’s shoulder, warm and alive. “Yes.”

“Who?” 

“Shao.” 

Newt stared at him, then he straightened up, his back making a rather loud sound of protest at the movement. “Oh, god.” He rolled his shoulders, getting a bit tangled in the cord on the pons before he pulled it off and dropped it to the table with a clatter. “Honestly, Hermann I’m impressed, I didn’t think you were sneaky enough.” 

It wasn’t all there. Not normal, not light, not Kaiju entrails on his side of the lab. Hermann played along anyway, too relieved to do anything else. “Well, I learned it from you.” 

“Oh, she never liked me,” Newt said, and turned in the chair to face him, their knees brushing together, shaking a bit under Hermann’s hand. He was in shock, and Hermann knew before he started that he would speak. “So, uh, some not very good stuff just…I know what you saw was bad, and I-” Newt trailed off, looking for all the world like he wanted to sink into the floor. Hermann waited. “I’m sorry.” 

“I understand.” Hermann shifted closer. For now, it would have to do. The rest, the investigations, if there would even be able in the hurry to expand on Newt’s insights to better prepare for the assaults, which they could now do together, finally, would wait. Not forever. There was a discussion waiting for them that Hermann expected they would have in pieces, spread out over months, years. Sinkholes and singularities. A lifetime to work through, and hopefully the rest of their lives to do it. 

Newt bobbed his head. “Later, ok. What’s going to happen now?”

Hermann glanced at the door, over Newt’s shoulder. There was nothing there. “I expect we’ll have to wait and see.”

Newt checked over his shoulder, because he always did. “They lock you in?” 

“I didn’t ask her to, but most likely yes.”

Annoyance crossed Newt’s face. “They won’t keep you in here.” 

“They might, but I agree. It’s unlikely.”

“Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.” Newt shuffled closer, almost at the edge of the chair, to slide his hands from Hermann’s own to the crook of his elbows, holding him close. 

Hermann smiled at him. “We would kill each other in a week.”

“That’s one way to make up for lost time.” 

That was not a discussion for now, either, though there were so many things to say. Then again, Hermann leaned forward and kissed him, and Newt responded with a sigh. His hand came up to hook behind Hermann’s neck, holding him to his mouth as he kissed with increasingly enthusiasm, sending shocks of pleasure down his spine that directly conflicted with the pain. 

Just when Hermann thought he might have to tell Newt to stop before they got carried away, he did, and pressed his forehead into Hermann’s own. “God.” 

“I know.” He ran his fingers lightly over the edges of Newt’s bandages, and felt the shiver that ran through him. “You won’t do this again?”

“I hope not,” Newt said, into his jacket. “It hurt like a bitch.”

“Be serious, please.”

“Why?” Newt threw back, unexpectedly lively. He sat up, and hooked his arms around Hermann’s shoulders instead. “I’m sick of it. I want to be myself again instead.”

Hermann hummed and raised his hand to trace Newt’s face. They’d given him glasses again, instead of his ridiculous contacts and sunglasses. Newt’s eyelids drooped, and it occurred to Hermann that it might in fact, be quite late. He hadn’t met with Shao until nearly three in the afternoon, and that must have been hours ago. 

He shifted forward, reaching out to activate the table, and Newt, misunderstanding, mirrored him, closing the last of the distance between them. He lowered his arms to Hermann’s waist and rested his face in the juncture of Hermann’s neck and shoulder, his nose resting in the hollow of his collarbone, covered by his shirt and jacket. Hermann froze, caught between embarrassment and delight. Then he let both of them go, and checked the time. 

“It’s after midnight.” 

Newt hummed into his clothes. “Happens like that sometimes.” 

Hermann huffed out a laugh, and leaned back. When he stood, Newt followed, still holding on, hand to hand, like he refused to let go. They shuffled over to the bed, with Hermann’s arm hooked over his shoulder for support, and he was still in pain, and Newt took the book with them. Hermann noticed these things in pieces, separate from the whole. 

Changing into pajamas was more than either of them could face, though Hermann did take his jack and shoes off. They curled up like children, limbs hooked over limbs, Hermann’s leg supported in the mix. It was just as he imagined it earlier, a slave to his aching soul. Despite his exhaustion, Hermann had the oddest impulse to take off his clothes, and touch Newt skin to skin, though it wasn’t a sexual impulse. But he didn’t, not the least of which was because he didn’t want Newt to feel compelled to do the same, and be confronted by monsters. 

Neither of them laid down fully to sleep, and Hermann wondering if NEwt felt the same as he did, that all this might disappear if he closed his eyes. Hermann trailed his fingers over Newt’s over the book. The cover was a faded red, peeling at the corners, with a cartoon outline of a skull in the center. “You loved this book, even before.”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

Newt thumbed through it, pausing at familiar sections, moving on. “Eh. I guess I probably read it in school, or at least I was supposed to.”

Hermann rolled his eyes. “Of course.” 

“You did all your homework? Even in the not science classes?”

Hermann huffed good naturedly, happy to fall back into softer patterns of old arguments. This had been what he missed most of all, just being present, with him, with this understanding. It felt as though when he breathed, Newt breathed with him. “Yes.” 

Newt stared at him. “Uh huh.” He was still fussing with the book. One of the pages fell out. “I’m sure you put a full and commanding effort into art class.” 

“I happen to enjoy art,” Hermann said, trying and failing not to get emotional at how easy this was, how fast it came back to him. To them. It had been...difficult before. Even before Hermann found out the full extent of the damage, when he still thought it was all just Newt. To go from being constantly in each others, presence, to learning and sharing together, to sharing everything, to nothing at all. 

Now Newt, never adept at reading the feelings of others, did roll his eyes. “Yeah. Anyway, I read it after my mom died, and when Trespasser came. I just got in the habit. I liked the way he wrote it.”

“I can see that,” Hermann said, content to be distracted from his turmoil for now. They would discuss it, dig up old wounds and heal then, but not now, he thought, as he turned the fallen soldier over in his hands. One line stood out, highlighted in two different colors. ‘It is just an illusion here on Earth that one moment follows another one, like beads on a string, and that once a moment is gone, it is gone forever.’

“Right,” Newt scooted down in the bed somewhat, nesteling further into Hermann’s side. “And then obviously, you know.”

“You related to it. I suppose it makes sense, for you to relate to a book in which a man is abducted by aliens.” 

“Or thinks he has been. You never really know. That’s sort of the point.” 

Hermann made a face. “How esoteric.” 

“Yeah. It was weird because I don’t even like his other stuff, like the one with the ice. It just freaked me out.” Newt shrugged, and Hermann felt it, pressed together as they were. 

He flipped back to the first chapter. “I’ve never read it, or this one, except for the parts you noted.”

“It’s not really linear.”

“Ah,” Hermann said, with supreme displeasure, and Newt laughed. 

“You can borrow it. Maybe it will do you some good.”

Hermann glanced at the door. There was still no sign of anyone. “Well, now’s as good a time as any, I suppose.” But he didn’t flip to the start or make any indication that he would do so, and Newt settled in closer, a line of heat against Hermann’s perpetually cold body, warming him from the inside out. Instead he thought about the line Newt had pulled, about secrets. 

“I can help you finish, if you’d like.”

“What?”

“The outline of your thoughts.” Hermann lowered the book and set his hand in Newt’s hair, pulling his fingers through the strands, simply because he could. “You feel as though they are indistinguishable from the Precursors, but they aren’t, I’ve seen it. You simply lack an outsider’s perspective. We now know that you are clear of them-” 

“Do we?” Newt asked, falsely casual. His fingers picked at the edge of the bandage, and Hermann reached down and stopped him. “Just like that? ‘So it goes?’” 

“Yes. I am sure of it.” Hermann settled in the familiar territory of ignoring Newt’s eccentricities in favor of getting to the point. “So, I can assist you in finishing the project, if you’d like. Though I expect we will have many other things to do as well, what with the war turning to the offensive.” 

“Oh you think?” Newt snickered, snapping back into a lighter mood. “More important than my wallpaper map?”

“Your what?”

“From the-” Newt craned his neck to blink at him and then looked back down. He turned a few of the pages, ignoring that Hermann was still holding the book, and then pointed. “That.”

Hermann blinked, taking in the first few words. Though he didn’t quite know why, Newt hadn’t asked him to, it was his first instinct to read the passage out loud, and the words felt foreign on his tongue. 

“‘The best outline I ever made, or anyway the prettiest one, was on the back of a roll of wallpaper. I used my daughter's crayons, a different color for each main character. One end of the wallpaper was the beginning of the story, and the other end was the end, and then there was all that middle part, which was the middle.’ This is-” He shook his head, but Newt poked him in the ribs, so he continued. 

“‘And the blue line met the red line and then the yellow line, and the yellow line stopped because the character represented by the yellow line was dead. And so on. The destruction of Dresden was represented by a vertical band of orange cross-hatching, and all the lines that were still alive passed through it, came out the other side. The end, where all the lines stopped, was a beetfield on the Elbe, outside of Halle. The rain was coming down.’” Hermann trailed off at the last, his mind strangely blank. Where they were, buried deep beneath the ground, it was impossible to know what was happening out in the rest of the world, as though it didn’t exist at all. 

Newt was warm and alive against him, and he’d crossed the end of the line. It was a disquieting feeling, the conclusion of a plan. Hermann had nothing for what came next, no back ups or alternatives, nothing to keep his mind busy and his hands working ahead of his heart except for a foolish book about time travel and aliens that might have saved Newt’s mind from tearing itself apart. Hermann didn’t have the same attachment. All he had in life was Newt, his work, and himself. 

This was as far as he thought to go, and he did it. The rest would wait, it would wait and then the world find them again. At his side, Newt breathed evenly, and Hermann tightened his arm around him. They did it. All that remained was to wait, or sleep, and Hermann knew he wouldn't. 

The circulated air irritated his throat, somewhat, and it was starting to annoy him that no one had sent word to them yet. But when he glanced down again, Newt was either asleep, or resting so soundly there wasn’t any difference. His face was pressed to Hermann’s chest, wound so tightly against him he dared not move. Even if he could, Hermann knew, he wouldn’t. Not ever again if he could help it. 

And perhaps he could stand to have a little faith the the rest would work itself out.

**Author's Note:**

> “And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human. So she was turned to a pillar of salt. So it goes. People aren't supposed to look back. I'm certainly not going to do it anymore.” - Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five 
> 
> Song for this fic / my entire life right now is The Tempest by Pendulum 
> 
> Thank you for reading! it's paradiamond.tumblr.com for more of this nonsense


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